To write the biography of Oliver Cromwell is admittedly an ambitious undertaking. In view of the wonderful wealth of material on the subject in existence, to say nothing of the living giants of seventeenth-century research who stalk the land, I hope it may not also seem presumptuous. My aim has however been a different one from that of the scholars from whose works I have derived such benefit. I have wished more simply to rescue the personality of Oliver Cromwell from the obscurity into which it seemed to me that it had fallen, just because there has been such an invaluable concentration on the political and social trends of the age in which he lived. It is at least possible to claim that Cromwell was the greatest Englishman. In the hopes of explaining to the general reader something of this remarkable man, I have set about my task – as one historian put it to me, half in jest – of ‘humanizing’ Oliver Cromwell.
In this context my debt to previous workers in the field will be obvious to all students of the period. In the field of biography alone there are two excellent modern studies: Robert S. Paul’s The Lord Protector: Religion and Politics in the Life of Oliver Cromwell (1955) and Christopher Hill’sGod’s Englishman: Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution (1970) whose sub-titles show their special field. There is John Buchan’s highly readable biography first published nearly forty years ago and going still further back Sir Charles Firth’s unrivalled Oliver Cromwell and the Rule of the Puritans in England (1900). This is without delving further into the plethora of works pertinent to the subject, foremost among them W. C. Abbott’s four-volume edition of Cromwell’s Writings and Speeches 1937–47, which replaced the equivalent work of Carlyle amended by Mrs Lomas, as the standard work of reference. In all of this, my criterion for the inclusion of material has been its relevance to the nature of the man himself, and its contribution to a rounded portrait of his character.
I have therefore taken the usual liberties in correcting spelling and paraphrasing documents, as and when it seemed necessary to me to make sense to the average reader today; I have, for example, altered the spelling of the word chief in the opening line of Milton’s sonnet quoted on the title page in accordance with modern usage. I have also ignored the fact that the calendar year was held to start on 25 March during this period, and have used the modern style of dates starting on 1 January throughout. In the case of material, I wish to thank particularly the Duke of Sutherland for permission to quote from the Bridgwater MSS; Lady Celia Milnes-Coates, Sir Berwick Lechmere Bt, Mr Raleigh Trevelyan and Lord Tollemache for permission to quote from their respective MSS; the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon. Edward Heath, and the Chairman of the Chequers Trust for permission to reproduce pictures and documents from Chequers; the Trustees and Curator, Mr Brian Wormald, of the Cromwell Museum, Huntingdon for permission to reproduce their pictures, relics and documents. I have been much helped not only by the works of others, as I hope will be made clear by the references, but also by the advice of certain experts in the field. I am most grateful to Dr Maurice Ashley, himself an authority on Cromwell and President of the Cromwell Association, for generous help at all stages and also for his valuable criticisms of my manuscript (although its warts are of course my own); to Mr H. G. Tibbutt for introducing me to Dr Williams’s Library, many suggestions on reading matter, and lastly for reading the proofs; and to Brigadier Peter Young for kindly checking the maps.
To the following I am indebted in many different ways: Mr Nigel Abercrombie; Sir John Ainsworth Bt, National Library of Ireland; Mr Jonathan Aitken; Mr A. C. Aylward, Clerk of the Peace, Huntingdon & Peterborough; Professor Thomas Barnes and the Librarian, Berkeley University, California; Mr Geoffrey Berners; Mr E. G. W. Bill, Lambeth Palace Library; Dr Christopher Bland; Dr Karl Bottigheimer; Mr M. S. Bull of Putney; Miss Anne Caiger, Huntington Library, California; Mr Robert Carvalho, Mr Edmund de Rothschild and the Jewish Library for assistance on the subject of the readmission of the Jews; Fr J. Clancy SJ; Mr J. W. Cockburn, Deputy City Librarian, Edinburgh; Mr E. J. Cowan of Edinburgh University; Lt-Col Leslie Cromwell; Dr Chalmers Davidson and Mr E. Gaskell, Librarian of the Wellcome Institute of the History of Medicine for consultation on the subject of Cromwell’s health and death; Mr R. N. Dore; Dr A. I. Doyle, University Library, Durham; the Marquess of Exeter; Fr Francis Edwards SJ for permission to use the Farm St MSS; Mr J. M. Farrar, Cambridgeshire County Record Office; Dr Roger Fiske; Earl Fitzwilliam; Mr Michael Foot MP; Mr Peter Foster; Professor Alexander Gieysztor of the Historical Institute, Warsaw for research into Cromwell’s alleged correspondence with Chmielnicki; Mr R. M. Gard; Northumberland County Record Office; Mrs I. M. Hare representing the Cromwell Bush family; Sir Nicholas and Lady Henderson, then of the British Embassy, Warsaw; Dr J. Hetherington of Birmingham; Mrs Margaret Hodson of Rugeley; Dr A. E. J. Hollaender, Guildhall Library; Mr J. P. C. Kent, Department of Coins & Medals, British Museum; Professor Frank Kermode; Hon. Mrs Edward Kidd of Holders, and the Bridgetown Museum, Barbados; Mr A. Lewis, Harris Museum, Preston; the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Rt Hon. Selwyn Lloyd and Miss H. M. Prophet of the Department of the Environment over the portrait of Mr Speaker Lenthall; Mrs Alice Roosevelt Longworth; Mr William McIntyre, Clerk of the Council, Gainsborough; Dr A. L. Murray, Assistant Keeper of the Scottish Records Office; Mr E. C. Newton of the East Sussex County Record Office for permission to read the Calendar of the Bright Papers and unpublished paper on the Protectoral Trade Committee; Dr G. F. Nuttall; Mrs Owen, University Library, Cambridge; my brother Mr Thomas Pakenham of Tullynally Castle for the use of the Pakenham MSS; Dr S. R. Parks, Curator, Osborn Collection, Yale University Library; the Rev. G. H. Parsons of Burford; Mr C. F. Penruddock, then Secretary of the Chequers Trust; my uncle Mr Anthony Powell for information concerning Cromwell’s Welsh pedigree; the Rev. R. L. Powell of All Saints, Huntingdon; Dr T. I. Rae, National Library of Scotland; Lord De Ramsey; Sir David Renton MP; Rev. E. L. B. C. Rogers of St Giles’, Cripplegate; Sir Ronald Roxburgh; Mr John Seymour; Mr Patrick Shallard; Mr Quentin Skinner for kindly showing me in advance of publication his essay on Thomas Hobbes, in The Interregnum, edited by Professor G. E. Aylmer; Dr E. C. Smail; Sir Christopher and Lady Soames, then of the British Embassy, Paris; Mr C. Stafford Northcote; Mr F. B. Stitt, Staffordshire County Record Office; Dr Roy Strong, Director of the National Portrait Gallery, for help over illustrations; Mr G. H. Tait, Deputy Keeper of the Department of British & Mediaeval Antiquities, British Museum; Mr Taylor Milne, then the Secretary of the Institute of Historical Research; Mr Keith Thomas; M. Marcel Thomas, Conservateur en Chef des Manuscrits, Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris; Mr E. W. Tomlin, Cultural Attaché to the British Embassy, Paris; Dr Thomas Wall of the Irish Folklore Commission; Mr Esmond Warner; Dr Charles Webster; Mr L. Peter Wenham; Mr Eric W. White; Mr A. D. Williams, Pembroke Castle Museum; Captain and Mrs Malcolm Wombwell of Newburgh Priory; Miss Lilian Wood; Mr Douglas Woodruff.
I would like to thank Mr Tony Godwin and Miss Gila Curtis of Weidenfeld & Nicolson; Mr Bob Gottlieb of Knopf; Mr Graham Watson of Curtis Brown; the Librarian and staff of the House of Commons; Mr Douglas Matthews of the London Library; Miss Kate Fleming for help in checking references; my secretary and temporary secretary Mrs Charmian Gibson and Mrs Jane Sykes, and Mrs V. Williams and her staff for typing. Lastly from my mother I derived the benefits of criticism of the high quality which only she could give, and from my father some equally unique insights into the nature of Puritanism. As for my husband and children, who have been in the front line for four years, I have sometimes thought that there should be a campaign medal for the families of those who write very long books, in which case they would all, from the oldest to the youngest, certainly be awarded it.
Antonia Fraser
Eilean Aigas
3 September 1972